Update to Celebrate Yin Mengâs Achievement)
Before the beautyâs words, Feng Jun remained silent, not out of coldness, but because he couldnât give her the promise she needed.
The girl stepped out of the car and walked a few steps, then came back and knocked on the car window, âWeâre still friends⦠right?â
âFriends, of course, no problem,â Feng Jun said with a smile and nodded, âMore than friends, less than lovers.â
In fact, he despised this phrase from the Japaneseâwasnât it just friends with benefits? Why dress it up with fancy wording? Hypocritical!
The girl paused, then smiled, âMore than friends, less than lovers? But honestly, you really are a good lover. I always thought it was a lie, but such things do existâ¦â
By the end of her sentence, she surprisingly extended her crimson tongue and licked her lips, then turned and walked away.
Under the dim streetlights, her action was unusually seductive, and coupled with her frail image, it presented a morbid yet unforgettable temptation.
âLittle impâ¦â Feng Jun shook his head, putting away those thoughts, and drove off.
The Passat pulled into the courtyard of the Penglai Grand Hotel. He stopped the car, took a huge mountaineering bag out of the trunk, along with a case containing three million in cash, and in his other hand, he carried a long roll of cloth as he walked confidently into the hotel lobby.
There was a security guard on duty in the lobby. Seeing him come in, he casually nodded towards the cloth roll and asked, âWhatâs that?â
Feng Jun glanced at him and responded dismissively, âA tripod.â
The security guard didnât say anything more upon hearing this; he was just curious and had asked casually. All hotels were the same; they would not interfere in the guestsâ private matters unless absolutely necessary.
After entering his room, Feng Jun felt there was something oddly nonsensical about the security guardâs question, and todayâs room gave him a strange, uneasy feeling.
Feng Jun couldnât pinpoint where this discomfort was coming from. He opened his backpack to check on the jade inside but found nothing amiss.
However, as soon as the backpack was opened, the four pieces of jade inside were seen by three watchers. The pinhole cameraâs quality was poor, and the angle was bad, prompting someone to ask softly, âIs that⦠jade?â
âDefinitely,â another person snorted coldly. If Feng Jun were there, he would recognize this person as Wang Weimin.
Because he casually took a rare stone last time, he offended Feng Jun, and even though Jubaozhai won the bid for the jade, Feng Jun refused to complete the transaction.
WangWeiminâs uncle took this matter to heart. If they hadnât successfully bid, it wouldnât matter, but it was like a duck that had flown away just as it reached their mouths.
He couldnât say anything due to the face of the chairman, his elder brother, but when it was brought up, he couldnât help feeling regret.
Wang Weimin had always been trained as the successor to Jubaozhai and had quite a high opinion of himself, so he found this hard to swallow.
It just so happened that there was a rumor lately that the guy who last sold the Mutton-Fat Jade was negotiating a new deal with Henglong.
In the jewelry industry, such rumors spread quickly. If someone gets hold of something valuable, they wouldnât hide it because everyone is targeting the same customer base. While there needs to be competition, sometimes collaboration is necessary.
After confirming the rumor, Wang Weimin was exceptionally irritated, thinking his uncle had predicted correctlyâthat guy indeed had other jade.
Anyone who could get jade in bulk was no simple character, and Wang Weimin was very clear about this logic. However, he really didnât want to endure his uncleâs complaintsâeven if they were only occasional outbursts.
So he told himself that perhaps that guy just had a bout of incredibly good luck, stumbling upon a large quantity of jade. Just looking at how he ate at KFC, one could tell he wasnât part of any big league.
In the jewelry sector, there were too many tales of fluky windfalls. Stories of finding diamonds or gold nuggets were often stumbled upon by unrelated individuals who then became overnight millionaires.
Wang Weimin preferred to believe it was the manâs luck.
Therefore, after getting wind of the news, he immediately had someone tail Feng Jun.
This time, he smartened up, opting for a professional rather than an amateur-in the past, Feng Jun had cleverly escaped at the jade market, and many people later talked about how cunning the guy was.
Zhengyang City had private detectives, and quite professional ones at that. The young Mr. Wang found one such information consulting firm.
The firm didnât disappoint his trust and somehow managed to locate Feng Junâs dwelling in Zhengyang.
Since they were just paid to do a job, they bore no malice towards Feng Jun. Although Boss Feng had practiced the Tai Chi Breathing Technique and had a certain level of premonition for danger, he couldnât sense much from those unintended observations.
I must say, Wang Weimin made the right choiceâprofessional matters require professional hands.
If he had sent his own people to tail the guy, not only were they amateurs, but also their own resentment and malice could easily alarm the other party.
However, professionals have their own concernsâthey emphasize stealth too much. When Feng Jun left the busy city for the suburbs, they didnât follow closely to avoid exposure, so they failed to discover that villa as a foothold.
Upon receiving the news that Feng Jun was staying at the Penglai Grand Hotel and, more importantly, that the guy was alone, Wang Weimin decided to try to monitor him.
As luck would have it, Feng Jun had had an argument with a member of the hotelâs engineering staff, and the information consulting company quickly learnt this detail. Consequently, they contacted the young engineer.
Xiao Lin was fuming. Whether it was because of his youth or instability, deep down he harbored a lot of resentment towards Feng Jun.
When the information companyâs people approached him, he quickly agreed to their proposal, especially since he was in charge of maintenance work, which meant he could easily tinker with things in the room when the guest was not around, without the need for any assistance.
Unbeknownst to Feng Jun, his wealth had already been exposed. He couldnât sense where the unease was coming from and, deciding not to recharge, he just stayed in his room watching TV.
Around eleven at night, he left again with a large bag, placed the items in the trunk of his Passat, and drove straight to the grove where he had earlier experienced a car shock.
Since he was feeling restless, he decided it was a good time to practice his Tun Na breathing exercise. His car was filled with jade, money, and firearms, which he couldnât allow anyone to touch carelessly, so he couldnât go to a park but had to find a secluded place for cultivation.
No sooner had he left than the surveillance companyâs car followed suit. The grove, although it was in the suburbs, now lay enshrouded in nightfall, which impaired human vision. They followed from a distance, with the headlights on; they could see the carâs license plate ahead, making the surveillance quite easy.
When they saw Feng Jun parking his car at the grove, they couldnât help but wonder what he was up to.
Wang Weimin, upon hearing the news, burst into laughter. âHeâs really asking for it. If he just stayed put at the Penglai Grand Hotel, it would take me a while to deal with him. But now, in the dead of night, heâs voluntarily heading into the wilderness?â
At that moment, he even recalled a famous line from The Investiture of the Gods â âThis object is fated to be mine.â
The âobjectâ he had in mind were, of course, those four pieces of jade.
Even though the pinhole cameraâs imaging effect was poor and it had been but a fleeting glimpse, Wang Weimin knew very clearly that the three pieces of jade Feng Jun had previously auctioned off were all extraordinary; therefore, the four in the backpack wouldnât be far off in value.
There was no need to go into details, but added together, the value of the four pieces of jade could easily be in the millions, with tens of millions not being out of the question.
Imagine, carrying valuables worth millions alone into the wilderness in the dead of night is pretty much like signing oneâs own death warrant, isnât it?
Wang Weimin would definitely not let this opportunity slip by. It was no longer merely a matter of personal vendetta. Even if he bore no grudge against Feng Jun, such news was bound to tempt himâit was a significant sum of money.
Now, what he needed to consider was how to rob the other party without leaving any trace.
Jubaozhai, just like Henglong, dealt in jewelry and gold, and also knew some under-the-table operators. Whether it was buying privately mined gold or gambling on stones from Myanmar, having a smooth channel meant that they had to interact with these shady characters.
But at the same time, Wang Weimin always remembered his familyâs instructions: These people could be dealt with, but one must not become too involved with them. A careless step, and one could be playing with fire and risk self-destruction.
So, he was somewhat troubled and asked the person from the information company, âXiao Liu, does your company only offer intelligence services, or can it provide other kinds of services too?â
Xiao Liu was quite young, a core member of the information consulting company. At the question, he blinked before his eyes twinkled, âOur company only offers consulting services. However⦠I can provide some additional services personally. What does Wang want to do?â
âI just canât stand that guy showing off,â Wang Weimin spoke indifferently, âCan you mess with him a bit, make it look like a robbery?â
âWellâ¦â Xiao Liu drew out his words then his eyes flickered, âCould you let me know how much those four jade stones are worth?â
Wang Weimin felt a little uneasy but eventually quoted a relatively fair price, âI didnât get a clear view, but based on my estimates, they could be worth over a million.â
âMore than a million?â Xiao Liu swallowed hard and licked his lips, his eyes shining with greed, âIf I get caught, Iâm really going to be in for it.â
âThree hundred thousand,â Wang Weimin casually named his price without blinking an eye, the young owner of Jubaozhai was not one to quibble over a small sum, âYou get the jade stones, Iâll pay you this amount⦠just leave his car alone.â
He thought things through thoroughly. The Passat was worth around two hundred thousand, a fixed value, and would be difficult to sell once stolen. It would draw heightened police attention whereas the price of jade stones was fluid and harder to assess.
Moreover, he had a feeling that the source of the other partyâs jade stones might not be legitimate. If robbed, the owner would likely have no choice but to accept it.
(The second update in seven days, cheers to âThe Corn Seller Uncleâ â mengmengda; 2/5, the last day of double benefits. Loudly calling for genuine subscriptions and double monthly passes.)